Jamie Noon’s try hat-trick was the centrepiece of England’s 43-22 victory over Scotland as the world champions finished the Six Nations by retaining the Calcutta Cup in London at Twickenham on Saturday.
But the victory, only England’s second of the tournament after their win over Italy last week, was a sorry consolation for the fact they finished fourth in the table — their worst placing since the competition was expanded to Six Nations in 2000.
Scotland, who also beat Italy for their lone win of this season’s championship, finished fifth. Australian coach Matt Williams has overseen just one victory from 10 Six Nations games since taking charge last year.
Newcastle centre Noon (25) was only the third player in the history of rugby union’s oldest international fixture, which dates back to 1871, to score a hat-trick, and he was the first to do so at Twickenham after England wings Cyril Lowe (1914) and John Carleton (1980) notched trebles on Scottish soil.
The remainder of England’s seven tries came from Joe Worsley, Josh Lewsey, Harry Ellis and Mark Cueto.
”I’m very pleased with that performance,” England coach Andy Robinson said. ”We knew it was going to be a fast game and that both sides would be up for it given the frustrations they’d had earlier in the tournament. I thought it was a very good game of rugby.”
Noon had been in the international wilderness for four years until the start of the Championship, when he got his chance following injuries to World Cup duo Will Greenwood and Mike Tindall.
”He [Noon] was one of a number of players we didn’t know much about at the start of the tournament. He’s got better and better in both attack and defence,” Robinson said.
For under-pressure Scotland boss Williams, meanwhile, there’s still plenty of work to be done.
”The defensive system is delivering players to the ball but we are missing too many tackles, full stop, end of story.
”There were patches of brilliance but what we’re not getting is an 80-minute performance,” he lamented.
Defeat still left Scotland searching for their first Twickenham triumph since 1983.
Fallible placekicker Charlie Hodgson missed an 11th-minute penalty but once more showed his quality with ball in hand after kicking a second penalty to touch to help England open the scoring three minutes later.
World Cup-winner Kay won the resulting lineout and the ball was moved along the line to Hodgson, who cut through a huge gap before passing to Noon.
Sale stand-off Hodgson converted and England went 7-0 up.
Missed tackles had cost Scotland badly in last week’s 46-22 defeat by Wales, where they were 38-3 down at half-time.
And seven minutes later, more bad defence saw England in for a second try after Chris Paterson had put Scotland on the board with a penalty.
England won the ball from the restart and the ball was worked to Noon, who burst through Allister Hogg’s attempted tackle, went past Ross and shrugged off the despairing attempts of scrumhalf Mike Blair and fullback Chris Paterson to bring him down.
The hosts then threatened a rout as they cut loose with two more tries before the break.
After good work by Hodgson and Sale teammate Cueto, blindside flanker Joe Worsley went in at the left corner, although it needed the video referee to confirm the score.
Then Cueto, cutting across from the right wing, took Hodgson’s pass and released Josh Lewsey, now moved from fullback to left wing, for the try.
But Scotland hit back with two tries of their own either side of half-time to reduce the gap to 26-17.
First, Scotland’s best passage of play in the opening 40 minutes was crowned when left wing Sean Lamont made the most of an overlap to cross England’s line with Paterson converting.
And five minutes into the second half, Scotland, trusting their instincts, had another try created by Paterson’s individual brilliance.
From inside his own 22, the fullback set off, beat the cover and then chipped over the top of the defence. His wickedly bouncing kick was regathered by Blair and he fed Andy Craig.
But no sooner had Scotland got themselves back into the match than England claimed their fifth try. Hooker Steve Thompson drove from a ruck and his pass found Ollie Smith, Balshaw’s replacement, on the blindside.
The Leicester back found clubmate Ellis in support and the scrumhalf flamboyantly dived over the line in the 48th minute for his first Test try.
However, Ellis was brought down to earth three minutes later when Scotland number eight Simon Taylor intercepted his pass and sprinted in 40m to put down.
But this time Paterson missed the conversion, leaving England 33-22 ahead.
Scotland, playing boldly, almost had another score when right wing Rory Lamont, Sean’s brother, broke clear.
But instead of passing inside to Craig he held on, although it still needed a crunching tackle from Lewsey to kill the chance of a try.
Noon, building on good work by the England pack, then went over on the overlap before Cueto scored the last of the game’s 10 tries in the 70th minute. — Sapa-AFP